[ThorSanchez]

They continually make an effort - just not the effort you want.

My KP is a wonderful camera, just apparently not what you want. Since they apparently can take please you, I hope you move to Nikon, and to Nikon Rumors, sooner than later.

You've made a point, several times, of noting that Ricoh has made a mistake in letting the flagship APS-C shelf sit empty for years. My K-3ii is a wonderful camera, too. But it might be nice to have an equivalent body with image quality and a few other features of the now three-year-old KP. And every time I imagine the shutter sounding a bit off I wonder what I'd replace my camera with if it fails.

Ricoh is engaged in a form of queuing theory. Just how long can customers at the grocery store wait in line before they give up, abandon their carts and leave? The store does this to minimize the number of cashiers they have to pay. Ricoh apparently does this because of a lack of resources to produce more cameras and lenses. But just the same, people will eventually go somewhere else. Hopefully the K-new comes soon, and is really good.

[Larrymc]

Ricoh is engaged in a form of queuing theory. Just how long can customers at the grocery store wait in line before they give up, abandon their carts and leave? The store does this to minimize the number of cashiers they have to pay. Ricoh apparently does this because of a lack of resources to produce more cameras and lenses. But just the same, people will eventually go somewhere else. Hopefully the K-new comes soon, and is really good.

Pure speculation on your part! How about prefacing your statement with "In my opinion" instead of throwing something like this out as a blanket statement.

[luftfluss]

Maybe Ricoh Imaging are making money with cameras, but I don't care much about it. Nikon announced their Z 20mm f1.8, so now they have a nice set of primes from 14mm to 85mm, top moch optics. Since 2016 that Ricoh have released the K1, they've been able to make one prime shared with Tokina, that's not that impressive IMO. Nikon lose money, it's not my problem if they make the products that I'm excited about, all that matter to a photographer should be the cameras, lenses and the images it can produce, not if a company is making money or not. There is something wrong here. This year and next year, I might well sell off half of my Pentax kit and buy a Nikon Z primes kit, bad for Ricoh as they lose me as a customer, but hey they've made no effort, can't make money without investing anything, at the end of the day it's Ricoh's problem to do what matters to keep their customers. What's sad with Pentax is that there is a wonderful crowd of passionate photographers, very loyal, very knowledgeable, very patient and very defending Pentax... and Ricoh beancounters don't seem to give a damn about it.

If you look at the Nikon Z system and see gear that meets your requirements better than Pentax does, by all means you should migrate to it. There is no point in settling for gear that does not satisfy, especially when it is so easy to sell your old gear via forums and online auction sites.

Pentax users have known for a decade how slowly Pentax moves compared with most other camera brands, so each person either accepts that or they don't and tries to move on. Railing against Pentax for not providing what you want should really be railing against yourself, because Pentax's recent history should inform one's decision into buying into the brand, and then later staying with the brand when your photographic needs/wants change.

Don't expect anything, and you won't be disappointed.

[ThorSanchez]

Pure speculation on your part! How about prefacing your statement with "In my opinion" instead of throwing something like this out as a blanket statement.

Whatever you want to call it, the effect is the same. People will only wait so long before they look elsewhere. Even Pentaxians.

---------- Post added 02-12-20 at 01:33 PM ----------

Pentax users have known for a decade how slowly Pentax moves compared with most other camera brands, so each person either accepts that or they don't and tries to move on.

I bought my K-30 in 2012. In '12-13 Pentax released seven cameras. In 2008-10 they released seven. Since 2017 they've released two, none since mid-2018. It's not like they've consistently released one or two bodies a year for a decade, things have slowed considerably in the last 3-4 years.

[taktoon]

Whatever you want to call it, the effect is the same. People will only wait so long before they look elsewhere. Even Pentaxians.

I waited so long for replacement for my da* 16-50 that I managed to become a father. Finally I bought dfa 24-70 and k-1.

[thibs]

I waited so long for replacement for my da* 16-50 that I managed to become a father. Finally I bought dfa 24-70 and k-1.

Congrats !
How if the AF handling the little one?

[luftfluss]

I bought my K-30 in 2012. In '12-13 Pentax released seven cameras. In 2008-10 they released seven. Since 2017 they've released two, none since mid-2018. It's not like they've consistently released one or two bodies a year for a decade, things have slowed considerably in the last 3-4 years.

K-30/K-50/K-500 were all nearly the same camera, as were K-5/II/IIS and K-3/II and K-1/II.

Anyway, I think the discussion was primarily about lenses, and development has been slower than most other brands for quite a while. And, unfortunately, we don't have all the third-party options that others do.

[taktoon]

Congrats !
How if the AF handling the little one?

Thank You.
The AF in OVF is OK, not great but sufficient. But as recently my son started to move around the floor (he will be nine months old this Saturday) I use more and more LV with face recognition and great lunar lander screen with the camera close to the ground. I like this solution a lot. If it worked a bit faster and in continuous AF mode it would be a real joy to use. I hope to see more'mirrorless' features in future Pentax cameras.

[EdWiser]

There needs to be a camera that makes people want use it instead of their smart phone. That gives better image IQ but links easy to a phone in a one touch way that lets them share their images. Making people get more into the photo hobby is what is needed.

[Rondec]

Maybe Ricoh Imaging are making money with cameras, but I don't care much about it. Nikon announced their Z 20mm f1.8, so now they have a nice set of primes from 14mm to 85mm, top moch optics. Since 2016 that Ricoh have released the K1, they've been able to make one prime shared with Tokina, that's not that impressive IMO. Nikon lose money, it's not my problem if they make the products that I'm excited about, all that matter to a photographer should be the cameras, lenses and the images it can produce, not if a company is making money or not. There is something wrong here. This year and next year, I might well sell off half of my Pentax kit and buy a Nikon Z primes kit, bad for Ricoh as they lose me as a customer, but hey they've made no effort, can't make money without investing anything, at the end of the day it's Ricoh's problem to do what matters to keep their customers. What's sad with Pentax is that there is a wonderful crowd of passionate photographers, very loyal, very knowledgeable, very patient and very defending Pentax... and Ricoh beancounters don't seem to give a damn about it.

For me, personally, I have chosen to fill in gaps in the lens line up with older lenses. So getting a 20mm f2.8 and a 135mm f2.8 lens on the used market is not too expensive. I use the FA 77 instead of an 85mm portrait lens and I guess I am fine with that. At the same time, I will be looking to purchase a new 20mm lens (I don't need f1.8 but whatever) and 85mm lens when they hit the market.

The important thing to me is that Pentax sticks around in the long term. If that means a slower but steady release of new gear, I am fine with that. It may be that Nikon can build a good user base for their Z mount, but I am afraid that they are going to burn through a lot of cash and find that Sony and Canon have beaten them to the finish line and they are the bronze medalist with 20 percent of the market or something like that. Is that a problem? Well sort of, when they aren't terribly diversified and camera related operations are a good chunk of their revenue. In Ricoh's case, as long as Pentax doesn't lose a bunch of money, they are content to have them continue making new gear. They are small and will continue to be small, but they won't go away either.

[biz-engineer]

Nikon can build a good user base for their Z mount, but I am afraid that they are going to burn through a lot of cash and find that Sony and Canon have beaten them

The reason I'm looking 360 degrees around is that I lost hope that lenses are an investment these days, and at the same time I can see some benefits of technology advancements for camera users. For me the K1 is a good baseline for photography because the image quality is at a level that allow high quality print at a decent size. On the other hand, the only glass not too heavy to can carry around on travelling is the DFA28-105, I'd carry two lenses, DFA28-105 and an ultrawide, except I've given up carrying the DFA15-30, good but too large as a walking about lenses, so my DFA15-30 stays home, I feel like it was a waste of money since I'm not using it. In comparison, a Z camera + 20mm + 24-70 f4 is about the size of my former K3 kit, but with a 45Mb BSI FF sensor and start of the art glass. Seeing Pentax slows down asks the question whether they'll be able to keep up with cameras tech, at the speed of which Canon and Nikon operation it seems that the Pentax tech will be totally lost far behind others which would be a major issue for Pentax to stay alive, Pentaxians won't buy products that are ten years behind Canon and Nikon. If I check who released what in 2019, I can see that Pentax is the brand for which there was no new product in 2019, the only other brand that didn't release anything for one full year was Hasselblad in 2018, every other brand released something in 2018 and 2019. It's the first time in history that there is no new Pentax camera product in 2019 (not even a special edition from an existing model), and that there is a Tamron rebadge only in 2020, it looks to me like Ricoh have cut resources on Pentax a few years back already, after the K1. I could make a chart in Excel showing the number of new product release per year per brand, and we would see that Pentax decreased faster than all other brands. At the moment, I see that Pentax is only slightly worse than Olympus, Hasselblad now owned by DJI is the only brand behind Pentax in terms of product released.

[taktoon]

Last releases by Pentax (at least for FF) are: 35HD and 10-17 HD fisheye and now 70-210 (in fact Tamron lens tweaked by Pentax - I do not have anything against that) these are products that needed very minimal effort from RICOH. We have also 'K-new' under the glass but recent post by OoKU said that it can be released later than this summer. There is no new FF camera on the table, not even a rumour. For me it is not enough. I am not going to sell my K-1, k-70 or lenses as they work just fine for 75% of my needs but my needs are not constant (next year I am planing to shoot more events and video). Have to say I would be very happy to see MILC K-1 successor in any mount with short registration distance

[reh321]

You've made a point, several times, of noting that Ricoh has made a mistake in letting the flagship APS-C shelf sit empty for years. My K-3ii is a wonderful camera, too. But it might be nice to have an equivalent body with image quality and a few other features of the now three-year-old KP. And every time I imagine the shutter sounding a bit off I wonder what I'd replace my camera with if it fails.

Ricoh is engaged in a form of queuing theory. Just how long can customers at the grocery store wait in line before they give up, abandon their carts and leave? The store does this to minimize the number of cashiers they have to pay. Ricoh apparently does this because of a lack of resources to produce more cameras and lenses. But just the same, people will eventually go somewhere else. Hopefully the K-new comes soon, and is really good.

K-30/K-50/K-500 were all nearly the same camera, as were K-5/II/IIS and K-3/II and K-1/II.

Anyway, I think the discussion was primarily about lenses, and development has been slower than most other brands for quite a while. And, unfortunately, we don't have all the third-party options that others do.

Actually, this thread is supposedly about Ricoh's earnings; any leaning toward lenses is probably because ILC bodies have been released so rarely lately no matter whether you count new releases or completely new bodies, the result is the same. My comments that ThorSanchez has commented on are because the "K-3ii replacement" has taken so long. My personal opinion is that they thought the line needed only one 'flagship"; only after they understood that the K-1 produced images too small in 'crop' mode and too slowly in 'FF' mode did they start thinking of another "APS-C flagship" camera, and producing that camera became complicated; I furthermore believe they would have made another run of K-3ii bodies if they had known about all these complexities - and now it has become too late for that. Unfortunately, I would not be surprised if this has caused several users to go to another brand, which would affect both demand for bodes and for lenses, slightly reducing their revenue and their earnings - but expecting them to see the future so clearly is totally unreasonable.

[ThorSanchez]

My personal opinion is that they thought the line needed only one 'flagship"; only after they understood that the K-1 produced images too small in 'crop' mode and too slowly in 'FF' mode did they start thinking of another "APS-C flagship" camera, and producing that camera became complicated; I furthermore believe they would have made another run of K-3ii bodies if they had known about all these complexities - and now it has become too late for that. Unfortunately, I would not be surprised if this has caused several users to go to another brand, which would affect both demand for bodes and for lenses, slightly reducing their revenue and their earnings - but expecting them to see the future so clearly is totally unreasonable.

I don't think it's that unreasonable to think they could have anticipated some backlash from the following sequence of events:

1) For almost 15 years they sold only APS-C bodies, and a very large number of APS-C specific lenses
2) The K-3 series sold for under $1000
3) The K-1 is a bigger, slower, $2000 FF camera that isn't optimized for most of those APS-C lenses
4) They decide that the K-1 is now the flagship camera that APS-C users will jump to en masse.

Many or most people bought into the K-5 or K-3 series because they're sub-$1000 cameras with a lot of features they like and they had built up a bunch of APS-C lenses to go with them. It's not rocket science to think that telling K-3 owners that their upgrade path is a much more expensive camera that is either 15Mp or heavily vignettes with most of their lenses might not go so well.

Car analogies only go so far, but would be like if BMW discontinued the $40k+ 3-series, and then was very surprised that everyone didn't just jump up to the $60k+ 5-series. "But it's a nicer car and everyone on the internet said they wanted one!"

[beholder3]

Seems like Fuji just has lost half of its profits from last year to this.
I wonder if their figures include the margin rich analog medium format instaxes or not.